Covering the World Cup
Over the next few weeks, Canadians will tune into their televisions, visit bars and watch parties for the FIFA World Cup in Qatar. It's a significant tournament, with Canada's men's soccer team qualifying for the first time since 1986.
While the journalists, producers, and production teams can’t control what happens on the pitch, they are responsible for how we see it on screen. In Canada, only Bell Media holds FIFA tournament broadcast rights through 2026, which means only TSN and CTV have full access to the cup.
Two alumni who are deep into World Cup production gave us a glimpse of what their work looks like. Meaghen Johnson ‘07, a senior producer at TSN, will produce two prime-time shows about the World Cup. Terry Indellicato ‘09, is an associate production manager at Sportsnet.
Preparing for the World Cup
Since Sportsnet has limited access to the tournament, Indellicato says they have to get more technical about the kind of access they will have.
"So preparing, we're basically looking at a coverage plan for like, how are we going to do the highlights? How are we gonna do the analysis? And you know, what kind of access to the players are we going to have, which is very limited, unfortunately," says Indellicato.
That means Indellicato and his team will have to get creative in what they can show on the air, so they might use other techniques to show the game's highlights.
"We use things like monitor graphics of players. So it's like, you don't need to see the player, but we'll show them, you know, in an image and the monitor to look, it'll look decent in our studio, like I said, stats boards, any kind of element, to elevate a story without actually seeing the video," says Indellicato.
Other than the creative techniques Indellicato will use on his show, he says that from Sportsnet's standpoint, they will emphasize telling the stories about the team each night.
"So over the last week, basically I wrote ten player profiles, which aired in Sportsnet Central in lead up to our coverage and are still going to be played over the weekend, where I just identified ten players who had kind of unique stories and how they got to be playing for the national team," says Indellicato
Indellicato says his interest lies in how unique the set of players is in Canada's team.
"Milan Borjan was born in Croatia, you know, emigrated, or moved to Serbia, then came to Hamilton. You know, that was his path to the World Cup. Obviously, Alphonso Davies was born in a refugee camp in Ghana, you know, somehow made his way to Edmonton. And is, you know, the biggest Canadian soccer player we've ever had," says Indellicato.
Indellicato also says that as the tournament continues, he'll have to follow what the players are saying, their stories, and what kind of access Sportsnet will have to the players' post-game.
"I don't know if Samuel Piette goes up and has a great game. Maybe you dive a bit deeper into his story, but basically, I'll be working with a producer who's covering and, you know, managing these like hits. Basically, we're gonna call them like a panel hit, where it'll be like all encapsulated highlights analysis," says Indellicato.
Johnson, who is an experienced producer for women’s soccer, says her main focus going into the World Cup will be producing two post-game prime-time shows.
One of the shows will be a highlights show of the game and another show, called “Canada in Qatar.”
"I was also involved in the 2019 Women's World Cup. When you're involved in those productions, where you're doing, you know, three games, in the case of Qatar, there's four games a day, they're very long days, and you're on the air the whole day," says Johnson.
Johnson says that sports journalism connects fans with the stories of the athletes.
"It's always so interesting to find these little nuggets that you can get to share with people that probably didn't know about it. So it's just part of journalism as a whole, obviously, and then specifically with sports journalism, it's sharing that passion and that love of the game," says Johnson.
Advice For The Next Generation
Indellicato has been pursuing sports broadcasting for 12 years; he says that his advice to students wanting to cover sports is to "be hungry and willing,"
"I'd say, you know, make sure you love whatever you're going into because the passion is the thing that will drive you and keep you going. And just always be forward-thinking. If you consume content, you can come up with new ideas on how to deliver that content," says Indellicato.
Indellicato also says his other piece of advice would be to work hard and take on any opportunity that comes your way.
"The opportunities come very few and far between. So it's like, if you don't seize the opportunity, it may never come again. Or it may be a while before it comes again. So take opportunities. Be comfortable in uncomfortable situations," says Indellicato.
Johnson, who started as an intern in TSN's SportsCentre newsroom in 2006, says her advice is built on her experience covering women's soccer when she noticed a gap in TSN coverage with Canada's women's soccer.
"It would have been early 2017, where I kind of noticed just, I guess, a gap in TSN's own coverage, especially again, when it came to Canada's women's soccer where we would pay attention to this team, you know, during the World Cup year, during the Olympics, but otherwise was largely being ignored. And I thought, you know, this is a sports team that I know very well, that I could really help with our coverage and help push it forward," says Johnson.
Johnson says that she advocated for herself and her ideas that she pitched to others who helped her provide more coverage for Canada's women's soccer team.
"So I think that that might be the biggest piece of advice I could give is, sometimes you have to be your own biggest cheerleader, I think, and I hesitate to say it because it is so cliche, but just you believe in yourself and your own abilities, your own knowledge, and I think others will see that, and that confidence will shine through for sure," says Johnson.